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Sunday, January 10, 2010

Sweet Potato Poutine

A number of years ago, I ran off to Montréal over Thanksgiving. My family was’t too happy about this, but I ended up being equally disappointed because I found myself in a place that had celebrated Thanksgiving a month earlier.

You see, I am a gravy fiend and will literally drink the stuff right out of the gravy boat when no-one is looking. With mashed potatoes, it’s a perfect meal, and the thought of missing this had me a little heart broken… That is, until I discovered Poutine!

It’s a weird name that sounds vaguely lewd, but it’s actually a fast food dish that originated in Québec. Whoever came up with this stuff needs to be worshiped because the only thing better than deep fried potatoes, is deep fried potatoes covered in a mound of cheese curd, that’s all swimming in gravy. The heat from the fries and gravy melts the cheese curd making for a creamy pile of meaty carnal heaven. Oh, and did I mention that the potatoes are traditionally fried in horse fat?! (don’t worry no horses were harmed in the making of this poutine)

I first came across the brilliance of using sweet potatoes in this dish at one of my favourite blogs, Gild the Voodoo Lily. Because the gravy and cheese curds are savoury, using sweet potatoes gives it a nice balance between the savoury and creamy elements.

If you’re in NYC you can get fresh cheese curds at Saxelby Cheesemongers, which has a fantastic selection of unique cheeses, but if you’re elsewhere, you should be able to find it at your local cheese shop.

Sweet Potato Poutine

Put the oven rack in the upper middle position and turn on to 450 degrees F.

Peel and cut the potatoes into 1/4″ sticks. Toss in canola oil to coat (don’t use olive oil, which has a lower smoke point and will burn in the oven). Sprinkle with some sea salt then lay in a single layer on a baking sheet. Put in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.

While the potatoes are in the oven, prepare the gravy. Heat the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat and add the shallots sauteing until soft and fragrant. Add the flour and stir to coat. Whisk in the chicken stock and port.

As the gravy begins to thicken, turn down the heat to medium low and add the demi-glace and thyme, stirring with a spatula to dissolve. Continue cooking until the demi-glace is completely dissolved and the gravy is smooth.

To serve, just pile up the potatoes and crumble the cheese curds on top. Pour the gravy over all of it and garnish with some minced parsley.

Tonight, The Simpsons will air their 450th episode and with it, the award winning and and groundbreaking show will also celebrate their 20th anniversary. To commemorate this, after the show, there will be a hour-long documentary, The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special: In 3-D! On Ice! featuring interviews with cast, creators and fans AND presumably this commissioned painting from Ron English (featured) will somehow be part of it.

Take a look at this pretty cool time-lapse above as English does his thing depicting Homer getting jiggy with it Jackson Pollock style.

I have a deep and abiding love of Ron English, so this Homer Simpson commission is uniquely awesome to me. I was never a huge Simpson's fan but I always acknowledged its influence on popular culture. This is super cool to me.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Broiled trout with bacon, onions, and raisins. You can get the recipe here, but I don't know what brought this on. I started watching Rachel Getting Married (oh ya, I got Netflix, so, thats definitely made my life easier), so I'm watching this movie, and who shows up but my absolute favorite Def Poetry Jam poet, Beau Sia! And ya, he's had the laziest website since for as long as I've ever known about him, but not my fault.

I bought a ton of painting supplies today, computer goodies, and some cvs things...lets hope all of this comes out to be something awesome and fabulous. I'm thinking of making maple mashed potatos to accompany my trout...-wanders off again-

Skulls, I don't know why I'm so crazy passionate about skulls, I really need to sit down and come to a strong conclusion about what they mean to me specifically. I have so many side feelings about what they evoke in me, I think I'ma spend some time breaking down what it means, but in the meantime, enjoy this wikipedia page.

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Lets do it. Painting and watching netflix this morning, though in reality I need to clean. Got a bunch of camera stuffs for christmas, so hopefully we will see some fun awesomeness in the soon future. But no guarantees. Heh.

Friday, December 25, 2009

I'm odd for the holidays...I think too much and smile too little. I drink too much before, but spend the day itself...just...contemplating. I've been listening to the Guillemots lately, though honestly my music selection has increased 3fold in the past month. But merry christmas, happy holidays, whatever you follow. While every day should be a time to come together, at least the commercialization of this one gives us a reason to -remember- to come together.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Brian Ewing has just released a couple of super limited edition giclee art prints.

The top print is titled “Dead Spring” and was originally featured as a cover for IWYS #5. Very few copies of that print are still available. The second print, titled “Hasta La Muerta” is already sold out. So, get on it NOW, if you want the other print.